floor and added angrily, 'And I don't care! I don't care what happens to you!' Then she threw herself against him, her voice breakingsn sobs as she cried, 'It's a lie! I do care, my darling Richard! I'll die if anything happens to you! I didn't mean to say those things.'
He held her chin in his hand. 'Easy, Viola.' He pushed the hair from her forehead. It was hot and feverish. 'I had no choice.'
Her body shook uncontrollably and she gripped his axt0s even tighter, oblivious to her maid, and the real possibility that someone might walk into the passage at any second.
'And no chance! No chance at all!'
Bolitho held her away and waited until she was calmer.
'I must go now. And I will take care.' He saw her returning anguish and said quickly, 'I must not damage my new watch, now must I?'
She tried to return his smile, the tears flowing freely down her face as she said, 'I would never forgive you.'
He turned and walked towards the stairway, and then stripped again as she called his name. But she did not follow him. Instead she held up one hand, as if he was already a long -,eay off. Beyond reach.
He found Allday waiting by the beached gig and said sharply, 'Back to the ship.'
Allday watched him curiously. 'They're taking powder casks to the schooner, Captain.'
'Is that a question?' He glared at him but Allday's face was unmoved.
'I was just thinking. Mr. Davy's not going to be happy about this.'
Bolitho clapped his arm. 'I know. And I have no excuse for taking out my temper on you.'
Allday squinted up at the timbered fort above the palisades, the white figure in one of the windows.
Under his breath he said, 'I know just how it feels, Captain.'
Bolitho twisted in the sternsheets to watch the boats busying themselves alongside the schooner. It had sounded so simple, so neat. To take two anchored frigates in a confined space was better than matching gun for gun in open waters. But many would curse his name as they died, nonetheless.
He sighed as the gig gathered speed towards the frigate. Puigserver had been right. He had learned a great deal since their meeting at Santa Cruz. Mostly about himself.
'All present, sir.' Herrick seated himself beside the cabin door and waited for Bolitho to speak.
Beyond the stern windows it was very dark, but it was possible to see the yellow lanterns moving back and forth between the settlement and the surf as the business of loading the schooner continued without pause.
Bolitho looked at the faces around the cabin. Everyone was here. He let his gaze rest briefly on Midshipman Keen. Even him, although the surgeon had told him he. would not be responsible for his condition. Keen looked strained, and whenever he moved it was easy to see the pain on his mouth and eyes. But he had insisted on rejoining the ship.
Mudge and Soames, Fowlar, looking slightly self-conscious at his first important conference. Davy, whose handsome features were still showing some of the dismay remaining from Bolitho's news about the schooner. Captain Bellairs, debonair and bland-faced in the gently spiralling lantern light. The purser, as mournful as ever. Armitage and Penn, like illmatched brothers, and lastly, below the skylight, Whitmarsh, the surgeon, his face glowing like a great beetroot.
Bolitho clasped his hands behind him. An average wardroom, he thought. No better, no worse than most, yet he was about to ask more of them than would be expected from a veteran company.
'You know me well enough by now to understand that I dislike speeches. Making or listening to them.'
He saw Herrick grin, and Mudge's tiny eyes vanish on either side of the great nose.
'At the beginning of this commission there were many aboard, wardroom included, who thought my methods too hard, my ideals too high for a ship on a peacetime mission. Now all of us know that things have changed, and our experience, our training is the only thing of value we have to protect us, and more to the point, those who are depending on our ability.'
He nodded to Herrick. 'Open the chart.'
As Mudge leaned forward to weigh down Herrick's chart with books and brass dividers he took another glance at their faces. Anviety, trust? It was too early to know.
He continued, 'The schooner will sail directly into the main channel, using the easterly headland for cover until the last available moment. Once on course for the rocks at the foot of the cliff,' he paused to lay the dividers on the small cross, 'the helm will be lashed, and the crew will take to the boat. They will be recovered later.' He made himself smile, although his heart felt strangely heavy. 'After we have excised the two frigates while their people are still collecting their wits!'
Penn said, 'We'll show 'em, sir!' He quailed under Mudge's withering stare.
'And sve,' Bolitho smiled at the scarlet-faced midshipman, 'driven on by Mr. Penn's enthusiasm, will move into the channel, rake both anchored ships, come about and rake 'em again.' He looked at Davy. 'So tell all gun crews to look alive. The first broadsides will be the telling ones.'
Bellairs drawled, 'Bit of a chance for the schooner, I'd say, sir. All that gunpowder aboard. One heated ball from the battery, and up she goes.' He blinked under Bolitho's level stare and added, 'No disrespect to the bold fellows aboard her, of course, but where would it leave us?'
Bolitho shook his head. 'The battery is old. I am almost certain that heated shot will not be available, for fear of splitting the guns. Normally they would not need it. With such an arc of fire, the battery can hit any vessel once itis within the two main channels.'
He smiled to hide the sudden doubt which Bellairs had laid in his mind. Suppose there was heated shot already simmering in furnaces? But he would have seen them, surely? No baskets could hoist glowing balls to that high rampart.
He said, 'And we will know that most of that battery is lying in the sea, where it should have been years ago.'
'We will weigh at first light tomorrow. The wind seems to be in our favour, and with luck it will serve our purposes. There remains just one matter…' He paused and saw Herrick watching him 'from across the cabin.
But he must not think of his friend. The best and firmest one he had ever had. He was his first lieutenant, the most competent officer in the ship. Nothing more counted. It must not.
He continued, 'Mr. Herrick will command the schooner.'
Herrick nodded, his face expressionless. 'Aye, sir. I'll take six good hands. Should be enough.'
Bolitho held his gaze, the rest of the officers fading around him as he said, 'I will leave it to you. If Potter wishes to join with you, then take him.' He saw Whitmarsh rising to protest and added harshly, 'He knows the channel. We need all we can get.'
The door opened slightly and Carwithen thrust his head into the lantern light.
'Beg pardon, sir, but the water casks 'ave been stowed, an' a message 'as been sent to say that the schooner is fully loaded.'
His gaze shifted to Fowlar, but there was no recognition. Fowlar's first step to promotion had already marked them apart, although it was possible they had never had much in common, Bolitho thought.
'Very well.' Bolitho waited for the door to close. 'Carry on, gentlemen. You '-all have your duties to attend.' He faltered, wondering why there were never the right-words when you needed them most. 'We will have little time for discussion until this matter is settled.' Or we are all dead. 'Remember this, and remember it well. Our people will be looking to you, more than they, or you ever expected. Most of them have never been in a real sea fight, and when we last met with Argus many still believed we had won a battle rather than secured a retreat. This time there can be no retreat, for us, or the enemy. Le Chaumareys is a fine captain, probably the best ever produced by France. But he has one weakness.' He smiled gravely. 'One which we have not yet enjoyed. That of supreme confidence in his ship and himself. His belief, and your skill and determination will win the day for us if anything can.'
They stood up, silent and grim-faced, as if only just aware _ of their responsibilities. The finality of their position.
Then as they moved towards the door Bolitho said, 'A moment, Mr. Herrick.'
Alone together in the gently pitching cabin, Bolitho said, 'I had no choice.'
'I would have been dismayed, had you selected a junior, sir.' Herrick smiled. 'So there's an end to it.'
